O’Donnells Classic Irish Country Cream 700ml $11.99 (Was $14.99)
O’Donnells Salted Caramel Irish Country Cream 700ml $11.99 (Was $14.99)
Fresh Irish cream from County Tipperary is combined with rich caramel flavours to create a delicious Irish Country Cream Liqueur
Alcohol Volume - 14.5%
Yes, but he hasn't tried Baileys.
It tastes about 1/3 the price (inflation).
If you've got a spare $11.99 try it.
I can drink both quite (maybe too) comfortably.
It's not quite as good as Bailey's in my view (flavour is more subdued) but for the price and after a few drinks I certainly won't complain
not as good as Bailey's we occasionally one or the other depending whether Bailey's is on sale. For the price though it is excellent.
Very different stuff. Last I checked this was a mix of cream with some cheap wine. Baileys is cream mixed with Irish Whisky.
Also explains part of the price difference: the alcohol excise on Baileys alone is quite exactly the price of O'Donnells.
Really? Bailey's is 17% and this is 14.9%, I wouldn't have thought it would be that different.
Baileys is cream mixed with Irish Whisky.
Yes, in the sense that it contains cream and Irish whisky; no, in the sense that Irish whisky is not anything like a major component of the drink.
Cream, sugar, spirit, maltodextrin, milk protein, cocoa extract, cocoa flavouring, Irish whisky, colouring E 150b, emulsifier E 471, acidity regulator E 331.
So there's more Irish whisky in it that colouring E150b, and less than "cocoa flavouring". You've got UHT cream, sugar, neutral spirit, a bunch of other ingredients that add up to "coffee whitener", and a drop of Irish whisky for marketing purposes.
the alcohol excise on Baileys alone is quite exactly the price of O'Donnells.
…what? Care to set out your maths there? 17% of 700ml = 119ml = about $10.80 in excise (I think).
Yes, add GST to that and you're at $11.88 for taxes. Pretty much the same as the current price of O'Donnells.
They only reason they can be that cheap is that it is essentially a fortified wine (with milk powder), and thus not subject to excise, only to WET.
quite exactly the price
Once you add in GST. And put the product on sale. And change "quite exactly" to "pretty much".
OK
with milk powder
So like the milk protein in Baileys then
But I'm sure the cheap ethanol and beverage whitener used to make Baileys is soooo much better than whatever goes into O'Donnells and the difference in price isn't mostly marketing hype /s
It's bad. I was being cheap and tried. Wasted my money. Really hard to drink. Didn't like it at all
Disgusting, not bad. Poured it down the drain. Instead of spending an extra $10, lost $15
Well Baileys is so well known it has its own Wikipedia article, whereas O'Donnell is just an Irish sounding name.
Baileys was invented in less than an hour before being handed over to IDV chemists to make it shelf stable. Even the name is marketing twaddle.
But it's still notable enough to have its own page in the world's most popular encyclopaedia. O'Billys or whatever this one is called only exists on Aldi's shelves because of the demand for it created by Baileys. Baileys is old too, so old that those chemists are all retired or dead, and Jago himself died at 93 years old in 2018.
O'Donnells bottle says "PRODUCED BY R. A MERRY & CO. LTD. CO TIPPERARY, IRELAND", which seems to line up with this website http://merrys.ie/contact/ and it looks like their brand is actually Merry's, which is also budget brand but is made with Irish whiskey.
The bottle also says "IMPORTED BY: ODONNELLS IRISH CREAMS, PRINCETON, MN", which must mean Princeton, Minnesota.
So Merry & Co have been producing this kind of extra budget wine based Irish cream for an indeterminate length of time (maybe they only just started making this for export), but the American "O'Donnells" company just imports it and calls it O'Donnells. Baileys was an invented brand too but that was over 50 years ago, at some point a brand and recipe stops being something just invented and starts becoming established. At some point recently invented marketing twaddle becomes just part of our lives and drinking culture. It's possible this O'Donnells drink tastes bad and that this brand won't exist in five years time no matter what price it is sold at. Aldi creates and kills products all the time. They probably won't replace it with Merry's or another whiskey based Irish cream or even Kilkennys, they will just stop selling Irish cream in Australia altogether.
@AustriaBargain: Baileys: [insert marketing gibberish]
Gullible people: bUt it HaS a wIkiPediA paGe
Baileys is old too…at some point it starts becoming established
At what point does it stop being UHT cream mixed with cheap neutral spirit and beverage whitener with a premium price for the kinds of people who think a Wikipedia page is a relevant consumer consideration?
@AustriaBargain: You tell me? You're the one who seems so down on O'Donnells because - let's see - something something cheap ingredients no Wikipedia page.
If I go make a Wikipedia page about it so now we're just talking about two drinks with fake heritages and cheap industrial surplus ingredients, will you start drinking O'Donnells then?
@GrueHunter: It just doesn't taste as good imo. I bought some for my mother and she thinks the same. I don't think Baileys tastes all that great either, but it tastes okay and I'll drink it. 50 years and billions in sales makes me think millions of people in the world also think Baileys is drinkable.
@AustriaBargain: It's definitely drinkable. A lot of people definitely prefer it. And that's fine, if it's because they genuinely prefer the taste.
But if they think it's better because they believe it's made with more than a drop of Irish whisky and that the ingredients are somehow higher quality, then they've swallowed a bunch of marketing horsesh*t and they're ripping themselves off.
I guess that's fine too. It's not my money they're spending.
@GrueHunter: I just think it tastes better. I don't think O'Donnells could be mass marketed like Baileys because it just doesn't taste as good, most people would buy it just once and never again.
Great read, thanks for sharing.
My dad drinks it for some reason. It's goon in a bigM in my opinion, disgusting. I don't like sweet white wine either though.
Closer to Father O'Learys
And I thought O mara’s is cheap already. I thought wrong.
With all the cashback deals it’s probably cheaper
Not available in QLD :)
Does anyone know the alcohol content?
possibly ~14.9% (source: google images)
Missed a huge marketing opportunity to call it O’Baileys Irishish Cream
O’Doyle Rules!
14.5% Source Bottle
Can confirm that this is terrible on chips and sausages
You tried it though, and that's what matters
When in Rome…
Blast form the past. Back in uni days buying these and butterscotch schnapps and making c sucking cowboys shots.
Thought we were hardcore as we were doing shots. Didn't realise the alcohol content was the same as if we were doing shots of wine.
Even the Church gives kids shots of wine. You're not doing high school properly unless you're downing bottles of triple strength double fortified black vodka cruisers which are so strong they had to invent a law to stop them from being sold.
Not on QLD i suppose??
Unless the rules have changed. Probably best to clarify in the title though.
Aldi is very depressing to shop in. Been once never again.
You go shopping for the experience?
Why would you when going to Coles is such an exciting experience!
You should try dumpster diving, it's a rush man.
I stand by my claims
Don't scramble trying to buy this. It's only good in coffee and even that's a stretch
Yet it was sold out when I went to aldi yesterday lol, but you're not wrong
Better than baileys imo
I hope you've learned from those downvotes that you're not allowed to have personal preferences. (Have an upvote)
You have made about 8 angry snarky or aggressively pedantic comments on this thread alone within 10 minutes - maybe you need some baileys. Or, I guess, RUOK?
I'm not really into alcohol, but I've been buying about 6 bottles a year of O'Donnell's Irish cream from Aldi for about 10 years. It's the only alcoholic drink I buy for myself other than a few bottles of Baileys Irish cream a year when on special. They taste slightly different, but I can't say I really prefer one over the other. In true ozbargain spirit I always buy the bargain priced one!
And then there is Kilkenny Cream.
may i suggest a blind taste test, akin to a pepsi challenge… minus pepsi, insert O’Donnells Irish Country Cream vs Baileys Irish Cream.
prefer kaluha
but for $12 (3 coffees) what's not to like?
tried to use this to make Espresso martinis before (in replace of tia maria or Kahula)…. it was horrible
I just googled recipes for that and it says to use vodka & coffee liquor.
This is neither of those.
mate if you had bothered to read my post i said in replace of coffee liquor… i still added vodka, espresso and sugar liquor…..
I didn't really like it when I tried it (the ODonnells Irish Cream). I get Cassidy Irish Cream from First Choice and think that one tastes great. Bit cheaper than Baileys.
Edit,. just checked the First Choice website and it doesn't seem to be available atm (Irish product….maybe issues with getting it here?)
Buy this. Drink a bit to make space. Then add extra whisky and a bit of thick cream.
WIN
![[ACT, NSW, VIC, WA] O’Donnells Irish Country Cream (Classic or Salted Caramel) 700ml $11.99 (Was $14.99) @ ALDI](https://files.ozbargain.com.au/n/53/698253.jpg?h=1f2930c1)
How does this compare to Baileys?